


Stones

by elusivelover_archivist



Category: Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Friendship/Love, M/M, Memories, The Force
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-31
Updated: 2014-12-31
Packaged: 2019-09-23 01:20:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17070770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elusivelover_archivist/pseuds/elusivelover_archivist
Summary: By Mona R.Luke discovers the importance of stones, and fire.





	Stones

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Cara Loup, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Elusive Lover](https://fanlore.org/wiki/Elusive_Lover_\(Star_Wars_archive\)) and was moved to the AO3 as part of the Open Doors project in 2018. I tried to reach out to all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are the creator and would like to claim this work, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Elusive Lover’s collection profile](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/ElusiveLover).

_‘We can choose to throw stones, to stumble on them,  
to climb over them, or to build with them.’_

Han paused in his work long enough to wipe the few lingering beads of sweat away from his forehead with his sleeve. He opened one of the canteens of water and tipped it up, taking a long drink before pouring a good half of the remaining liquid over the top of his head. Still dripping for those few precious seconds before the water evaporated away in the dry heat, he shaded his eyes and looked up at the golden sky. It was hours past midday, but the unrelenting heat hadn’t lessened any, and both suns were still high in their arc, not quite ready yet to slope their way down to evening, when the temperature would cool to something near-livable. Turning his head to the side, he watched his black-clad companion for a few moments, envying him his native indifference to the temperature. Luke seemed to sense him watching, and paused in his work.

"You can stop and take a rest, you know, if you’re tired. I can easily do this—"

"No, just taking a water break, kid. Don’t worry about me, I’m great." Han held out the water, a question in his eyes.

Luke shook his head, giving Han a smile that didn’t quite seem to touch his eyes, before returning to his work. Han closed the canteen and slung it on its strap over his shoulder, and resumed, as well.

It had taken a little while for Han to figure out what exactly it was that they were doing here; he had been surprised when Luke came to him a week ago and told him that he felt the need to come back here, for some reason that he couldn’t quite explain. There had been something slightly off about Luke for weeks, now, and Han hadn’t been able to figure it out; Luke had provided no help to him, either, equally at a loss. The tiredness in his eyes was understandable; for seemingly endless months after Endor, they all had been plunged into an ever more unrelenting schedule of events, both political and military, social and – happily – extra-curricular, but it wasn’t only tiredness in Luke’s eyes, and it wasn’t only the work that plagued him. He seemed to thrive on it, taking on all of the responsibilities that he could manage, along with Leia and Chewie and Lando and Han himself and the rest of their merry band of Rebels, and, at least for the first little while, his exhaustion was a happy one, as they made progress towards a new and better world order on the largest possible scale.

On a much smaller but no less important scale, they had become lovers. It was unexpected, but apparently only for the two of them; Leia betrayed little regret at seeing her brother and her best friend so happy together, Lando smiled quietly as he collected on a few well-placed bets, and Chewie had been downright gleeful – rather insufferably so, Han grumbled loudly whenever he was in earshot. It changed very little in their lives, on the surface; far beneath, when he awoke in the middle of the night with the golden warmth of Luke asleep beside him, Han tried very hard to think of anything else in his life that had ever meant so much, and always came up at a loss.

* * *

It was one evening on the ‘Falcon that they had the conversation that led to their return to this place. Luke had been striding restlessly through the corridors while Han took care of one of many small repairs his ship constantly demanded and listened to the click of Luke’s heels on the floor. He knew better than to stalk Luke through the halls and demand to know what was wrong, and instead bided his time, doing what he could while he waited for Luke to come to him.

"Can I help?"

Luke was in the doorway, hands clasped behind his back, head at an angle, restless even when stock-still.

Han shook his head. "I’m almost done. You hungry?"

"No." Luke paused, then frowned. "Yes. Maybe."

"Well," Han said, with a chuckle, "that clears that up. I didn’t think it was that difficult a question. Maybe I should try something easier."

Luke grinned at him. "I could eat."

"That’s all I wanted to know." Han stood up, and set the panel he had been working on back into place. "Let’s see if we can’t find something."

They sat silently together over food for half an hour, eating steadily. Han watched Luke and Luke pretended not to notice; Luke opened his mouth to say something and stopped himself several times, and Han pretended not to notice _that_.

"You’re great company tonight, kid," Han said affectionately, when he stood to clear away the few dishes they had used.

"I aim to please," Luke replied, with a smile that quickly faded. He smoothed a crease in his sleeve with his fingers. "Han, I think I need to go to Tatooine."

"Okay," Han said, surprised, but then again not. He sat down and picked up his water glass and took a sip. "So when do we leave?" he asked, casually.

Luke started, looking into Han’s steady eyes, and then sighed, with a smile. "As soon as possible, I guess."

"I’m ready whenever you are. Ship’s even in good shape, for the moment."

Luke nodded.

"Should I ask why we’re going?"

Luke shook his head. "I’m not sure. I just – have to go."

"Okay. It’ll probably take a day or two to get flight clearance."

"I have a few things to handle, too." He frowned again. "I hate just leaving like this."

"Leia will understand," Han said, soothingly. "That’s the thing about your sister and you – you’ve got the unconditional love part down pat."

"It isn’t just Leia and I who have that part down," Luke said, and stood up. "I’ll go and get things moving, then."

"I’ll be here."

Luke smiled at Han, but it was obvious under the facade that the restlessness was still haunting him.

* * *

They arrived in Mos Eisley but didn’t stay long; there were few happy memories to be found there, just still the same crush of discarded people who never seemed to change. From there, they went to the crumbled remains of the Lars farm. There wasn’t much left of it, but Han watched quietly as Luke walked around, trying to see in him anything of the innocent boy he had been when they first met. It was only five years since that first meeting, but Luke seemed enormously changed; there were new lines in his face, worn from space battles and emotional upheaval, too much sudden responsibility and not enough rest. Han rubbed his hands over his own face and wondered how much he’d changed, himself, in that amount of time. Infinitely, he supposed.

After a short while, Luke came back to the speeder, and sat in the driver’s seat, deep in thought. Han watched him think without asking any questions, knowing that Luke would tell him as soon as _he_ knew.

"This isn’t it," Luke said, finally. "This isn’t why I’m here." He looked at Han with eyes like the sky.

"Let’s go and find it, then," Han said, and Luke nodded and started the speeder.

They glided over the surface of the planet, Luke easily navigating through the familiar territory, knowing that he could do it with his eyes closed, if necessary. It wasn’t a route that he had taken many times, as a youth, but he knew it precisely, and when he stopped the small vessel at its final destination, he looked down at himself as if he expected to find his black uniform transformed to white and tan again, droids in the speeder instead of Han. He looked up, waiting for the elder hermit to appear in the doorway and beckon him inside.

Han was watching him unquestioningly, waiting for him to make a move to stay or go, and Luke finally stepped out of the speeder. The Force was like echoes and whispers in his mind, an unending litany of the past and the present and the future, and it spoke to him all the time; it was only how he listened to its song that ever changed. Sometimes, if he closed his eyes tightly, he could hear Yoda and his father, speaking to him as if they stood at either shoulder, whispering their wisdom into his ears, as others had whispered to them. And always, all around, were the deep cadences of his first teacher, the one who had taken him from his mother’s arms and watched over him ever after, the one who first set his feet upon the path of the Jedi.

"Ben."

* * *

Han followed Luke into the tiny, tidy house, and watched him shiver. It was much cooler in here, but only seasonably, at least to Han. He knew that Luke would probably be cold save for his black tunic and trousers, and appreciated to himself that Ben Kenobi was more like him than Luke, someone who had come from a different world than this, probably one much more temperate, but had nevertheless chosen to end his days here, watching over Luke.

"Can’t say that I blame him," Han muttered to himself, and Luke turned and gave him one of those half-smiles that told him his thoughts had travelled yet again. It was damned unnerving whenever he did that, and yet, almost despite himself, Han smiled back.

* * *

Luke walked through the house, going through all of the rooms – all three of them. Everything was the way that it had been the last time he’d seen it; apparently the power of Ben’s mystique held sway with the sand people even when he wasn’t here in person. There was a layer of dust everywhere, and some sand that had blown in through the shuttered windows, but other than that, it was a place arrested in time.

He easily found the trunk where his father’s ‘saber had been kept so long, in trust, and knelt down to open it, feeling as he did no twinge of guilt, no sense that he was disturbing things when he had no right. Ben was a part of him, now and always. Father, and teacher, brother, uncle, friend. It was a continuum that they lived in; life, and death, meant very little in the Force.

It was only here in this world that death had any real meaning. Luke stole a glance over at Han, trying to imagine not seeing him again, then shook his head and blinked back the sudden pain that seared his eyes. "No."

There was clothing in the trunk, among other things – leather boots that had long lost their polish, a long braid of light brown hair tied together with a shorter lock of silvery gray and brown, another ‘saber handle that would not power up when Luke tested it, scorched black from some battle long in the past. Underneath, folded neatly, was a uniform Luke knew instinctively had belonged only to a Jedi: a tan tunic and trousers, a worn brown robe. He gasped aloud when he pulled the clothing up and found something else underneath it: a face that stared up at his own.

It was paper-thin and seemed deceptively fragile, just undecorated white plaster, something that a child would make in school. The face itself was caught between that of a child and a man, somewhere in his mid-teens; smooth-faced but not babyish, with sightless eyes and parted lips that seemed caught in mid-sentence.

Somehow, even without the beard and free of the lines of age, he knew that it was Ben.

Luke lifted the mask in his hands, turning it over, looking for a mark. There was none, only a continuous expanse of white, molded in the youthful image of his friend. He held it in two hands and brought it up to his own face, closing his eyes and feeling the rush and flood of whispering memories that were not his own.

"Master."

* * *

It was nearly dusk when they finally finished. Han mentally cursed himself for not bringing one of the service droids from the ‘Falcon, even though he knew that Luke never would have accepted the help; some things needed a warmer touch, and such was this tribute. It didn’t look like much, to him, just a rough platform of stones in the middle of the desert. He hadn’t asked Luke what he was doing, merely watched him to discern the pattern, and then began picking up stones himself and piling them together. It was almost waist-high when Luke decreed it finished; a base large and long enough to hold a full-grown man.

Han sat down with his legs flung out in front of him, exhausted and drinking the last of the water from his canteen and wishing for something stronger, while Luke went into the hut and brought out the things that he’d found from the trunk. He spread the robe out on the stones first, then the tunic and trousers, which he tucked into the boots. The ‘saber handle rested in one ghostly hand, and then Luke placed the mask inside the hood. He stood a long time, looking at the remnants of a life lost; it wasn’t enough, it couldn’t ever be enough, but it was all that he could do.

Except —

He disappeared into the hut again, and Han smiled at him when he reappeared with a tall, thin cobalt bottle and two glasses. Luke handed the bottle over and sat down on the ground beside Han.

Han pried the bottle open and sniffed. "Wine," he said, pouring a glass. "We’re lucky it hasn’t gone to vinegar, in this heat." He handed the glass to Luke and poured another for himself. Raising it in a toast, he said, "To the old man."

Luke smiled. "Yeah," he agreed. The bottle had been buried in the back of a low cupboard, and the wine inside was cool and refreshing. He knew that between the hours of work in the sun and the lack of food, it wouldn’t take much to make him drunk on it. He handed his empty glass back to Han and stood up, steadying himself with a hand on Han’s shoulder. Along with the wine, he’d also retrieved the final artifact from the trunk – the glossy lock and the smooth braid of hair – and wondered, as he placed them over the heart of the tunic, if either or both of the locks belonged to someone Ben had known and loved.

The effect was complete: if he squinted, it seemed like a man lying there. A man lying on his tomb.

It hadn’t been his father that he’d burned that night on Endor. It was a mask, a husk, more machine than man – but there was something in the act that had compelled him, something cleansing about those flames that had cauterized more wounds than Luke could possibly even have known existed.

This – this wasn’t real. It wasn’t real, and maybe it was too late. But it was the best that he could do.

Han rested a hand on his shoulder, and handed the half-empty bottle back over to Luke, who shook the remaining liquid over the wool and linen, also soaking the hair and the mask. When he lit and struck his lightsaber against the rock, the entire pyre lit up, almost at once.

They watched it burn, flames licking fabric and leather and hair into ash, scorching the dull metal of the saber anew. "It’s been five years," Luke said, and Han nodded, thinking, _Five years since we met_.

Luke turned his head and his eyes smiled at Han. "Since Ben died, I mean," he corrected Han’s silent thought.

Han shook his head. "I hate it when you do that."

"No, you don’t," Luke chuckled.

"No, I don’t," Han admitted, grudgingly.

Luke sighed. "I loved him, and yet I barely knew him at all. I haven’t had the chance to love many people in my life. I wish I’d had the chance to talk to him more, and listen to him, and hear more of his story. He told me more about my father and myself than about his life, and I didn’t know then that I wouldn’t have the chance to ask him."

"Would he have told you the truth, do you think?" Han asked, remembering the wild tales the man could spin, where truth and half-truth mixed and mingled with ease.

"Everything he told me was the truth," Luke said, and added, with a chuckle, "from a certain point of view."

"You’re starting to sound like him," Han said. "Or do all Jedi eventually end up as crazy old men?"

"I don’t know," Luke said. "You’ll have to wait until I get old and then tell me if I’m crazy."

"Don’t worry, I will," Han snorted. His voice went rough and low when he asked, "What would you want to know, if he was here right now?"

"I don’t know," Luke said, musing. "Probably, if he ever loved someone. If he was happy in his life. If he knew my mother. What the world was like when he was my age." He shrugged. "Everything."

The flames were dying down, and the wind picked up, lifting the ashes from the pyre up into swirling, dancing clouds and scattering them into the night.

"It’s getting late," Han said. "Will we stay here tonight, or go back to Mos Eisley?"

"Go back," Luke said decisively, after a moment’s thought. "I’d rather sleep on the ‘Falcon tonight than anywhere else."

"Sounds good to me." Han looked around. "Is there anything else here that you need?"

"No," Luke shook his head. "Nothing here."

Han nodded. "Let’s go, then."

"Okay." They started back to the speeder, and Luke said, "Han?"

"Yeah."

"Thanks." For being here, for coming with me.

"I wouldn’t be anywhere else, kid."

* * *  
The End  
* * *


End file.
